No Longer Damned
by Longlivetheprincess
Summary: "Shh… Frisk, I have heard every word you ever thought about yourself. Do not give yourself too much credit. You are not a damned soul. If you should take it from anyone, take it from me."


My heart. I can feel it shattering into pieces as I lie on the freezing hard ground, wrenching and squeezing itself for every horror I have wrought, every pain I have inflicted on others, the multitude of grief I have poured onto other's souls. It squeezes itself over and over, crunching itself under the weight of my grief and my guilt. I cry out in pure agony as my heart yells out with me. I sob but I cannot even express the amount of emotions that crushed themselves onto me.

I see now why Chara distances themself from feelings. All they ever do is bring you pain, indescribable pain that strips you to your very core and beyond. Maybe Chara had the right idea. To remove yourself from emotions completely, that would be ice in a blistering desert. My soul cries out in agony as raw grief pours itself over me, reminding myself of what a monster I am to have done what I have done to my very own family.

My family is so concerned about me. They love me. I do not want them to. I can not let them. They only help to make my heart wrench violently in my chest, a soundless scream echoing through my lips. Their questions, their concerns, their grief, their suffering, it all gets absorbed into my suffering soul to echo over and over in my head, until their voices join together and they speak in one, telling me of what I have done to them, how many times I had trodden on their dust, of the trail of death I leave to those who care for me. I cannot say no to them. The look on their faces, the soundless "o"s shouting in my ears, it is too much for my heart to comprehend. I cannot break into tears, if not they feel the need to comfort me, then the tears run down their faces, and my heart shatters all over again.

Is solitude truly too much to ask for? Space, that is all I beg for. To hear the sound of my tears and my tears alone shattering the silence of the room is all I wish for. I can not need your presence. Pure guilt washes over me every time they step into the room, their halfhearted cheerfulness, their forced light tones, their fake "I shall leave you alone,"s,

 _I cannot handle it._

I cannot say no to you, I cannot tell you to go away, or my heart will squeeze itself until every last tear is shed, every last scream is shattered, and every last person is driven away.

Even as I treat you so unfairly, I am too treated unfairly so. Your presence fuels my never-ending shame at wanting you to just _go away_. I lie there, gasping for oxygen like a fish on dry land. My tortured moans reaching the four dusty corners of the small room and bounce back to my own ears as the four walls groan and shift in my agony. Will there ever be joy for the righteous such as them? Will justice ever be done to the liars and the murders and the thieves such as me? Will there ever be a day that when I get judged for everything I have done in the way I have used my lives, that I will be set afire on and sent to group with the damned? Is there any justice in the Universe left? Or is the Universe as cruel as Man has depicted it?

I am bleeding from every pore, my energy to fight it soaring out into the unknown. The weights of my failures crush me from above while agony pushes up from the bottom. Shame and guilt shoves my left while grief and sorrow rams into my right. And worse of all, from within, a reminder of my family shoots out from my soul to force its way into my mind. A reminder of my family's tears, my family's guilt, my family's sorrow, my family's doubt, and my family's love. They are all so stupid to love me. They are angels while I am the opposite. And I might be on the side of the angels, but I wish they knew to not think for one second that I am one.

I could not be further from being an angel. I am the odd one out, the damned in disguise living with the angels. The damned's cover is so good that every angel is fooled, but however, at the end of the day the angels will always triumph and the damned be sent back and tortured relentlessly. I have no intention of changing that. That is the way the Universe operates and it is so definitely for the best. The damned cannot live with the angels as much as the yin cannot live with yang. I cannot live with those who love me so dearly. The outcome will never be good for whoever would ever be as foolish as me to try it.

I am so tired. I am exhausted. I am just so tired of trying to fight the inevitable. I do not want to keep crying. I do not want to keep on pretending that I am something that I am not. I do not want to keep hurting those who I love and I will always love. I will let the Devil claim me. After all, is that not natural instinct? We always go back to where to where we belong.

I shut my eyes as Darkness welcomes me home.

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 _An infinite amount of time passes as I float in nothingness._

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"Shh… Frisk, I have heard every word you ever thought about yourself. Do not give yourself too much credit. You are not a damned soul. If you should take it from anyone, take it from me."

My eyes shoot open at a broken voice whispering into my ear. My head is cradled by none other than Alphys, my head in her lap, her glasses cracked and her tears in my hair. I try to wrench away from her, but she pulls me with a firm grip into a sitting position and tight into a hug.

I stiffen. My arms fall limply to my sides. My throat is dry and painful. My back and neck are utterly sore, and my eyes sting at the dull moonlight shining through the window.

Alphys continues to speak. "Frisk, have you been told on how I was like back in the Underground? I was utterly broken, cracked, and destroyed. I saw no point in living an endless cycle of unending torture, and hope was a fantasy, a child's fairytale, nothing more as to deceive young children that there was a reason worth living, that you should not just end your life as it is nothing but a relentless cycle of pain, one of billions. After all, what was one depressed soul when there were millions of brighter, bigger, and more beautiful ones?"

I cannot help it. My arms rise with their own will and wrap themselves tightly against her, squeezing with energy I did not know I currently owned. I suppose it is fitting, as she is my literal lifesaver, which is why I have no idea why I am holding on so tight, refusing to let go, let go of this anchor anchoring me to where I do not belong.

My heart thunders in my chest, and all of a sudden I am a young child again, the hiding underneath my covers and hugging my stuffed lizard as the wind rages and howls outside my window, rain pouring down in torrents, the thunder and lightning striking harshly, demanding to know where I am. I clutch my stuffed toy tightly, tears that has run out many a minute ago threatening to fall down my cheeks. My strength wavers, and a single tear escapes and trickles down past my nose, my lips, down my chin, and onto my stuffed toy. It cries along with me, not wanting to be taken by the storm booming outside of the safety of my blankets yet again.

"Alphys," I whisper, my voice cracking and throat burning. "Did- why- how long did you feel that way for?"

Her grip tightens around me and her tears flow faster. "Years and years, Frisk. Even Undyne could not fully make me stop feeling like a broken doll, meant to be thrown away; not even close. I believed I was a hindrance to all, one who was destined to let everyone down. I failed once, and my failure and it was locked deep down, away from light and anyone who ever glanced upon it. They would not see it. But I saw it each and every day, and it haunted me for years. Every day it would taunt me from its darkened corner, mocking me and spitting in my face. It weighed upon me each and every day."

Suddenly, I am crying again, tears stinging my eyes as they flow past onto golden scales. The sound of harsh rain beating the ground fills my ears, and I am suddenly oddly comforted at the safety of the warm tears and the comforting arms. I sag, the tension leaking out of me as her scaly hand strokes my hair.

"How did you stop feeling that way?" My words are barely recognisable, some coming out as whispers and some in stutters, tripping over themselves.

"I never truly did," her tone broken, her voice cracking. "It had gotten better only when you managed to uncover the secret that had weighed down on me all these years. I had been in a severe state of paranoia when I had written that note. To think that my deepest secret would come to the light of day! Surely you all would despise me now. Surely you could not bear to look at me without disgust written plainly on your face. After all, what is the very worse thing you can do to your very best friends?"

" 'Tell them your darkest secret,' " I breathe, finishing the quote. " 'Because, if you tell them, and they decided rather not know, you can't take it back. You can't un-say it. Once you've opened your heart, you can't close it again.' "

And in that moment, I pull back and see Alphys for the first time. I see the broken doll under layers of false boldness and courage. I see her walls shatter and break. I see the desperation and vulnerability shining at the back of her eyes. I see the beautiful soul shattered into smithereens and built back with depression and devastation. Most of all, I see Alphys.

In that moment, Alphys sees Frisk. She sees the fragile heart under layers of false cheerfulness and happiness. She sees the walls fall and crumble. She sees the loneliness and fear falling out in the form of tears. She sees the determined soul broken into pieces and built back with resignation and despair. Most of all, she sees me.

"Oh Frisk," she whispers, and as the thunder claps and the rain pounds outside of my dry haven, I inhale the scent of familiarity and home as it wraps its arms around me.


End file.
